No Ceiling, Only An Exposed Roof: Old Alabama Town

Since 2010, members of the Slave Dwelling Project have been applying its vision, mission, and goals at historic sites in twenty-five states and the District of Columbia. We must honor the enslaved Ancestors through our actions. You can find many locations that we’ve visited once. The Bush Holley House in Greenwich, Connecticut; Smith’s Castle in North Kingstown, Rhode Island, and Kingsley Plantation near Jacksonville, Florida, are some examples. You can also find places the Slave Dwelling Project visited numerous times. Holly Springs, Mississippi; Magnolia Plantation and Gardens in Charleston, SC; and the Hempsted Houses in New London, Connecticut, are examples.

Preservationists prefer that historical buildings remain in their original locations to maintain their historical significance. Moving a building to save it should be a last resort. Some sites exist because historic buildings moved from other places are there. The Slave Dwelling Project interacts with several of these sites; Arkansas Museum, Little Rock, Arkansas; and Dallas Heritage Village, Dallas, Texas.

And then there are those places like Old Alabama Town that pop up sporadically. Most of the buildings on the site were moved there from other locations. My first visit to Old Alabama Town was in 2010 when I was an employee of the National Trust for Historic Preservation and assigned to the state of Alabama. That early visit to Alabama prompted me to change the name of the organization. The name, the Slave Cabin Project, was changed to the Slave Dwelling Project because the first building that I slept in while in Alabama was undoubtedly not a cabin. This first visit to Old Alabama Town also prompted me to delve deeper into the urban slavery that was a part of that peculiar institution of chattel slavery. My limited South Carolina education had slavery relegated to plantations in southern states. In hindsight, that revisionist history robbed me of an opportunity to instill pride in me in my early life.

A youth group from Florida Gulf Coast University prompted my second visit to Old Alabama Town in 2015. While I tried to get the group to meet me somewhere in South Carolina where I reside, group leader, Vanessa Fernandez, insisted that meeting take place in Alabama. The math worked, and Old Alabama Town was receptive to the idea. 

Fast forward, and the third visit to Old Alabama Town would be September 19 – 21, 2019. Sporadic is how I define the Slave Dwelling Project’s relationship with Old Alabama Town. We come together when it is necessary and convenient. I recall that the conversation about this past stay came out of a larger discussion about the possibility of having a Slave Dwelling Project Conference in Alabama.

Planning is now an essential element of how the Slave Dwelling Project interacts with historical sites. Gone are the days of the one-man-band. We are now a 501c3 non-profit governed by a board of directors, so we function as such. As a result of this manner of operation, planning and documenting is necessary. The initial planner Old Alabama Town Kelly Hallberg accepted a new job. As a result, Carole King took over the planning of the event and did not miss a beat. Carole conducted the preparation of the first two times that the Slave Dwelling Project visited Old Alabama Town.

Jerome Bias, our lead cook and organizer for our living history troupe, would join me on this visit. Jerome would have the pleasure and rare occasion of cooking in the hearth inside the building where we would spend the night. The slave dwelling functions as a museum. It has two rooms on both levels. Each compartment has objects in them that can be touched. I think that the chambers are overly adorned because enslaved people would not have owned some of the items displayed. The exterior of the dwelling is made of bricks.

Coming in on Thursday allowed us the convenience of carrying out our responsibilities in a well planned and systematic manner. The reception on Thursday night was a gathering of heavy hitters in Montgomery as Jerome and I shook hands with judges and the like.

So, in a previous visit to Montgomery with my family, I visited the Legacy Museum. This visit to the museum would be my second, and it was just as humbling as the first. The museum is a great place to learn about the legacy that slavery left on this great nation. In that museum are the names of people lynched on containers of dirt that came from the places the incidents occurred. You are forced to look up at the names etched in metal columns of people lynched. Interpretive signs reveal reasons people got lynched, for example: “Private James Neely was lynched in Hampton, Georgia, in 1898 for complaining when a white storeowner refused to serve him.” I took a photograph of everyone of those interpretive signs.

For the past two years, the Slave Dwelling Project has been engaging stakeholders in the possibility of conducting the Slave Dwelling Project conference in Alabama. This visit to Old Alabama Town allowed me the opportunity to have a face-to-face meeting with some of those stakeholders. We all concluded that the year 2021 looks promising for the Slave Dwelling Project conference to be held in Montgomery, Alabama.

The campfire conversation was attended by a diverse group of people, some from as far away as Atlanta, GA. The opinions were vast. The setting for the gathering was near the slave dwelling where some of us slept. During the conversation, we were remined continuously that we were in the city limits with vehicles always buzzing by on the street that bordered the property.

It ended in all of us singing songs, a first for a campfire conversation gathering.

Conclusion

I don’t know when the Slave Dwelling Project will revisit Old Alabama Town, but I know that a visit will happen in the future. It could be a stand-alone program, or it may be in conjunction with a Slave Dwelling Project Conference, but our paths will cross again. I don’t know how many of the African American audience I encountered were at Old Alabama Town for the first time. I do know that I saw and engaged a high percentage of African Americans at the three planned public events. For me, that’s the hope that nullifies those images etched into my young mind about Alabama’s resistance to civil rights.

Thank you, Old Alabama Town, let’s continue to right this wrong together by educating the public about the real history of Alabama and this nation.

Kelly Hallberg

Spending the night in a slave dwelling was not something I ever thought I would do, especially one located in downtown Montgomery. I have been following the Slave Dwelling Project for a while and I knew I had to participate in the overnight stay with Joseph at Old Alabama Town. Although I have spent many daylight hours giving tours of the original two-story slave dwelling, I didn’t expect the emotional impact the overnight stay would have on me.

People who know me know that I am not a late-night person. I go to bed relatively early and wake before sunrise. That being said, I didn’t go to sleep until 1 am. I shared an upstairs room with two other women. I made a spot for myself in front of the fireplace with my quilt blanket, top sheet, and a pillow. The night was unseasonably warm for September and the room had very little airflow despite the open balcony door and two open windows.

I laid down on my make-shift bed on the hard, wood floor and observed my surroundings. No ceiling, only an exposed roof. Candles burned on the fireplace mantle and illuminated the room. The names of enslaved men, women, and children were written on one of the walls. My mind was filled with so many thoughts and questions. How many enslaved individuals slept in this room? What were their last thoughts before falling asleep each night? I could hear the faint sound of snoring from another room (in between the sounds of traffic and police sirens). Did they keep each other awake by snoring? Were they kept awake by crying? I awoke at 5:30 am and was immediately filled with an overwhelming sense of emotion. Spending the night allowed the energy and emotions within the room to become a part of me.

With only 4 ½ hours’ sleep, I offered to help Jerome prepare the midday meal. The fire in the hearth was hot, the kitchen was hot, and the temperature outside was hot! It took all morning to prepare the meal but was well worth it. The food was a delicious-eggplant creole, sweet potato pone, greens, and apple pie.

This was an experience like no other for me. I witnessed strangers become acquaintances and acquaintances become friends. I am so thankful to Joseph McGill, Jerome Bias and everyone else involved with the Slave Dwelling Project. Their mission and message is so important and I was blessed to see the impact it had on the people here in Montgomery, Alabama.